stitch by stitch i tear apart
by onceandfuturewarlock
Summary: Things are just harder for Merlin around this time of year, and there's not anything that can ever make it better, but he's learned to shut up and smile, he's learned how to keep his chin up, how to hold his head so high no one can hear it when he breaks. But oh, God, he breaks.


"Stitch by stitch, I tear apart,

If brokenness is a form of art,

I must be a poster child prodigy."

\- _Neptune_, Sleeping at Last

* * *

Things are just _harder _around this time of year.

That's really all there is to it, the simple and bare-bones truth of the matter, and there is no getting better, no getting over it, no magical moment when it all goes away, when it feels even sort of all right, when he thinks _maybe, just maybe, this cold and terrible ache inside me will ease, maybe one day, the weight on my chest won't feel so heavy, maybe there will come a day when I finally feel like I can breathe—_

Things are just harder for Merlin around this time of year, and there's not anything that can ever make it better, but he's learned to shut up and smile, he's learned how to keep his chin up, how to hold his head so high no one can hear it when he breaks—but oh, God, he _breaks_, and it's _ugly_, when he breaks, it's messy, it hurts, it's pain so sharp he cuts himself up on the edges, it's nightmares and shadows under his eyes and tears soaking down in his sheets and _I couldn't sleep but_ _I'm all right_ and a tiny, wooden dragon clutched closer than a child's favorite toy to his hollow chest.

It's ugly. It's messy.

But at least it's quiet. At least he has learned how to be quiet about it, how to sleep with his hand to his mouth so Gaius won't hear the repulsive, wracking sobs ripping from his chest in the dead of the night when he can't keep all the broken pieces inside him from spilling out.

At least he knows better now than to burden anyone with it.

Or. Well. He thought he knew better, but when Gaius comes back in, leftover tears still cling to Merlin's cheeks in thin, sticky trails, and he tries to pull his lips up in a smile and say _pollen _or even _Lady Wentworth's perfume_ because that's worked before, hasn't it, on everyone, on Arthur, on Gwen and the knights and the sweet, worried serving-maids, and he's not going to burden anyone with any of this, but Gaius' old eyes flicker down the tiny, carven dragon in his trembling hand before he can drop it or hide it or put it down—

Merlin opens his mouth, and he tries to say something—anything, anything will do, anything will be better than this awful silence—but it sounds shaky, and stuttery, and stupid—ugly and messy, just like all the rest of it—and he doesn't get much past the first syllable anyway because Gaius pushes the door all the way open then, and he steps inside, and he pulls Merlin to him in a tight hug, and Merlin—

—Merlin starts to cry.

And this time, _he just can't stop_. The tears are just—just there, all of a sudden, in his eyes and rolling down his cheeks and dripping off his chin and running like a river, running like the sea, and the sobs are growing like plants in his chest, like flowers, like vines, thick and heavy and starving for the sun, and he can't breathe around it all and he has to let it out and he opens up his mouth and he lets it out and he can breathe again but it's all so ugly and messy and it hurts, and it shakes his body with the merciless, unforgiving force of it, and he can't look at Gaius, he can't look at anything, so he closes his eyes and he presses his forehead, hard as he can, to the rough cloth of the old man's robes.

"—I should have saved him," Merlin says, because he can't do the right thing, the decent thing, and push Gaius away and say he's fine, "I should have saved him, I should have tried, I should have—I should have done more—" He doesn't even know if Gaius can hear him. He can hardly hear himself, words warped by the sobs and tears and thick red fabric of Gaius' robes.

"No, Merlin," Gaius says, and his hand is warm and firm on Merlin's shuddering shoulders, "you did everything you could."

"—I didn't—" Merlin tries to shake his head, to say _no, I should have done more, I could have done more, and you know it, too, don't you,_ but he can't, he can't do it, because if he does, and Gaius shoves him away, says _yes, you should have, you could have, and you didn't_, if Gaius says that, if Gaius blames him the way he knows he deserves to be blamed, the way he knows Balinor would blame him, were the man himself here to do it, if Gaius blames him, too, Merlin thinks he'll crumble all to pieces, and he'll never, ever be whole again.

—but—

"You did nothing wrong, my boy," Gaius says, softly, like he can hear all the words Merlin doesn't let himself say, and he smooths down Merlin's uncombed hair with wrinkled hands. "You did_ nothing_ wrong. You are not to blame."

"—he—" Merlin should pull back, should say he's sorry, should leave Gaius alone now, because hasn't he already put enough on the poor man's weary shoulders, but he can't, he can't, he could swear Gaius is the only thing that's kept him on his feet these last few minutes, and if he tries to let go, he thinks he really might fall, "—he was g-going to get his life back, Gaius."

"I know," Gaius says, heavily, like the words carry all the weight of all the world inside them.

"I was going t-to make him _h-happy_ again."

"Oh, Merlin," Gaius' hand tightens in his tangled hair, "if he met you, I would think he already was."

* * *

**Notes: opened an ask game on my Tumblr recently for anons to send me Merlin!whump prompts lmao and BOY HOWDY did they all deliver. had to close the requests sooner than I wanted - there were just so many! - but I really don't write enough Merlin & Gaius, so this was,,,,,,, a balm,,,,,, to my weeping soul,,,,,**


End file.
